Pages

For The Record..."In an interview with Yahoo! Singapore, Zainudin (Nordin, FAS President) reiterated that the S-league will not become a "poorer cousin" once the LionsXII start their Malaysia Cup campaign."

Saturday, December 05, 2015

Making Up For The Lost Time ...

"This was for me the hardest night of international football in my career. The two players on my side were like horses, running up and down, and I didn't expect that (Almawas) was that fast, or that (Al Shibbli) was that good."

"I didn't expect ... was that fast, or that ... was that good." were those key words tersely summarized by the 23-year-old on both Mahmoud Almawas and Alaa Al Shibbli who rugged him that night at Kallang.

Shakir Hamzah (right) got it pass Japan's Keisuke Honda (4)

Moreover, it wasn't the first time we faced the Syrians whom we narrowly
lost to weeks ago on road which was why I was taken aback by those
quotes.

To be honest, I would never anticipate thoughts like "didn't expect ... was that fast ... was that good" to be said after an international competitive match by a player representing his country when adequate preparation should be in place for that kind of intensity.

And when those words were uttered, what could it be interpreted as? To say the lack of adequate preparation for the recent World Cup Qualifiers could be something hard to accept when there were not much shuffling in recent selections that gelling up shouldn't be much an issue.

THE INVISIBLE GAP ...
Yet, I am more inclined to the suggestion by some that lack of sparring matches against quality opponents is one of the factors that triggered those thoughts from Shakir.

It is widely acknowledged the huge gap between domestic and international football that many players who may thrived domestically had found the transition hard when earning their caps on a bigger stage (just think hard to recall who were those called up to play a few games before diminished from the radar).

Jamil Ali (left) has been consistency at a point being overlooked, why?

Part of the Strategic Plan unveiled in 2010 is "to expose our National Teams against the Top 15 in Asia and Top 50 in the world where possible" and there was a time it was hardly possible when the National Stadium was not ready yet to attract any marquee team to play against the Lions.

Just when the cornerstone of the Sports Hub is ready to their arms open, several well documented controversies surrounded the playing surface which hogged the sending out those invitations.

Imaging the tourist dollars revenue if we often versus teams like Japan

And when we are ready to do so, news revealed the standoff between the stadium operators and leading international media rights company MP & Silva who are planning to revive the Merlion Cup to allow Singapore national team to complete against some notable sides.

If that agreement had granted MP & Silva any exclusive right to negotiate on behalf of FAS on staging the Merlion Cup, which took its name from the uniquely Singapore icon?

If so, does that meant FAS do not have any say in that negotiation between MPS and Sports Hub over the staging of the said tournament which prompted the shift of tournament venue outside Singapore in deadlock can't be resolved, as mentioned?

High rental costs of the National Stadium, as it may seems, to be the stumbling block in the ongoing wrangling but let us not forget it is still a new and prominent landmark of this country that shall be utilized in boasting the tourism industry by inviting some big name teams to face the Lions in the new arena which wouldn't mind hosting them given the FIFA international dates are already made available for the next three years, thus allowing some adequate planning ahead in aspects like marketing, drumming up of awareness, etc.

MPS-FAS linked up in February 2015

There must be somewhere things can work it out

Supposedly, schedule of these international friendlies are already made known in advance to players, hope it will motivate them to prove their worth to the national selectors who might want to try out some fresh faces in these non-competitive fixtures to accumulate some exposures (perhaps some FIFA ranking points too).

No comments:

Post a comment

"While I allow comment/feedback to be posted using the moniker "Anonymous" but comments containing discrimination of race, derogatory terms and seditious remarks will NOT be tolerated and will be deleted, if necessary, at the blog owner's discretion!

Please don't abuse it, thanks

And the blog owner WILL not be responsible for comments by visitors except those of his own

All comments are subjected to moderation and publish upon determination, thanks

LinkWithin

Like BoLASEPaKO.com on Facebook

Follow @bolasepako on Twitter

Follow @bolasepako on IG

Please Take Note

On any entry of this blog will see graphics, pictures, hyperlinks to various external sites (such as Facebook, etc.).

As this blog has NO right in governing those external sites via those hyperlinks, pictures or graphics. Therefore, some of those hyperlinks may be "broken" after a certain period.

Also of late, URLs of some graphics, pictures which I previous linked from selected facebook albums of my accounts had been altered that some may have appeared to be broken, which I'll gradually address this issue along the way.